TR: Last Trip of 2012 and First Trip of 2013 Pt. 2: Discovery Cove & Fun Spot credit whoring (12/30/2012)

Months in advance, we booked December 30th to be our Discovery Cove day. There was a fair amount of debate involved in the decision of precisely which day to do, but that was the one we selected, and once we did, we were pretty hard wired into it. Naturally, this would turn out to be the coldest day of the trip, with temperatures opening in the 40s that morning and never rising much above 60. Going and having a good day at Discovery Cove would, to a degree, test our physical mettle as well as the facility itself, and it seems that both us and the park were up to the challenge.

TR: Universal, IOA, and Magic Kingdom Pt. 4 (11/27/2011)

This was yet another long day. Anyone who does this hobby long enough can tell you when they’ve booked these kind of days into the schedule. 3-4 parks, some driving, lots of riding of stuff, lots of feeling exhausted when its all said and done. While we didn’t go all out the day prior, this was going to be a day involving some appreciable “work”. Fun, yes. But effort was to be expended.

For the second straight day, we arrived at IOA early for Harry Potter time. This time though, we left even earlier, getting to the gates around 7:45AM and then into the section before 8AM and entering the line for the wand shop. I happen to think its a pretty cool little show that goes on there even if its just selling crap no one needs, but perhaps peopleneed a reminder. Amusement parks are really grotesquely constructed monstrosities intended to entertain at the most base level and then use that entertainment to push you in the direction of buying crap you don’t need at a huge markup. Sometimes its easy to forget that, I know.